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Velvet and Vice: Power Has a Body Count
Paperback
Publisher: Independently Published
Published: Mar 5 2026
Pages: 402
Weight: 1.18
Height: 0.89 Width: 6.00 Depth: 9.00
Language: English
Power is quiet.
Power is patient.
And when it is threatened, it can become deadly.
Lucy Hawthorne is a writer who studies corruption for a living. She spends her days examining the subtle ways influence moves through politics, money, and ambition. What begins as research for a fictional manuscript soon becomes something far more dangerous.
Because the story she is writing starts happening in real life.
When three powerful donors connected to a rising political campaign are found murdered, the details surrounding their deaths begin to mirror scenes from Lucy's unpublished manuscript. The similarities are too precise to ignore. Someone has been reading her work - and using it as a blueprint.
Suddenly Lucy is no longer just observing power.
She is standing directly in its path.
Detective Carson Locke is assigned to the investigation, and the deeper they dig into the lives of the victims, the more disturbing the truth becomes. The murdered men were not simply wealthy donors. They were part of a hidden network of influence built on private deals, political leverage, and carefully protected secrets.
But the murders are only the beginning.
As Lucy and Carson uncover layer after layer of corruption, they begin to realize the crimes may not be random acts of violence at all. Someone has been studying the system from the inside, analyzing how power behaves under pressure and pushing it toward a breaking point.
And Lucy herself may be part of that design.
With every revelation, the stakes grow higher. Powerful figures begin to panic. Evidence surfaces that could destroy careers, reputations, and entire institutions. And when someone inside the investigation is murdered, it becomes clear that the system is willing to protect itself at any cost.
Now Lucy faces an impossible decision.
Expose everything and risk tearing the entire structure apart - or reveal the truth carefully and watch the consequences unfold one piece at a time.
Because once the truth is seen, it cannot be unseen.
VELVET AND VICE is a gripping mystery thriller about corruption, power, and the dangerous people who study both. With shocking twists, rising tension, and a story that feels chillingly real, it explores what happens when someone pulls the thread of a system that was never meant to unravel.
In a world built on influence and secrets, one question remains:
What happens when someone refuses to look away?
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